The present invention relates to bread slicers, and more particularly to bread slicers capable of slicing and bagging a continuous stream of loaves.
As recognized by the old adage "The greatest thing since sliced bread", bread slicers have revolutionized the production, marketing, and consumption of bread products. Typically, slicers fall into one of three groups. The first group is for high-volume users and includes assembly-line type slicers wherein the unsliced loaves enter at one end of the machine and pass through slicing and bagging operations before exiting at an opposite end. These large machines include expensive band-type blades for rapidly slicing the loaves to deliver a production rate of about 60 loaves per minute. The second group is for low-volume users and provides only slicing. A power-belt or gravity delivery mechanism presents the loaves to an economical oscillating blade slicer. The sliced loaves must be bagged by hand--perhaps with the assistance of a hand-operated bagger. Production rates of machines in this second group are about 6 loaves per minute. The third group is for small-volume (on demand) users and includes machines typically referred to as countertop slicers capable of slicing a single loaf at a time. These smaller machines also include oscillating blade slicers adequate to slice single loaves at relatively low speeds.
Known machines do not meet the needs of many medium-volume users such as small wholesale operations and large retail operations requiring production rates between 6 and 60 loaves per minute. The high-volume slicers are too expensive and complicated for such operations, while the lower volume slicers are too slow and labor intensive. Consequently, this middle-market segment must make an undesirable choice between machines which are relatively expensive and more sophisticated than their needs dictate and machines which are too slow and labor intensive to meet their manufacturing requirements.